COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING

Background: The origins of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) (an

approach, not a method) are to be found in the changes in the British
language teaching tradition dating from the late 1960s.

Another impetus for different approaches to foreign language teaching

came from changing educational realities in Europe. With the increasing
interdependence of European countries came the need for greater efforts to
teach adults the major languages of the European Common Market and the
Council of Europe, a regional organization for cultural and educational
cooperation. Education was one of the Council of Europe's major areas of
activity. It sponsored international conferences on lan-guage teaching,
published monographs and books about language teaching. The need to
articulate and develop alternative methods of language teaching was
considered a high priority.

Although the movement began as a largely British inno-vation, focusing on

alternative conceptions of a syllabus, since the mid-1970s the scope of
Communicative Language Teaching has expanded.

Main Leaders: Wilkins, Henry Wid-dowson, Christopher Candlin,

Christopher Brumfit, Keith Johnson.

Theory of Language: The communicative approach in language teaching

starts from a theory of language as communication. The goal of language
teaching is referred to as "communicative competence” (the ability to use
the language correctly and appropriately to accomplish communication
goals; communicate competently). It has an eclectic theoretical base (they
did not follow only one style). Some of the characteristics of this view are:
language is a system for the expression of meaning; the primary function of
language is for interaction and communication; the structure of the language
reflects its functional (having a special purpose) and communicational uses;
the primary units of language are not merely its grammatical and structural
features, but categories of functional and communicative meaning as
exemplified in discourse.

Theory of Learning: The important principles are: activities that involve

real communication promote learning; activities in which language is used for
carrying out meaningful tasks promote learning; language that is meaningful
to the learner supports the learning process; language activities are selected
to promote meaningful and authentic language use; fluency is an important
dimension of communication; communication involves the integration of
different language skills; learning is a process of creative construction and
involves trial and error.

Aim: Learning to communicate within the context. The students must

become communicatively competent. Communicative competence involves
being able to use the language appropriate to a given social context. Students
need knowledge of the linguistics forms, meanings and functions.

Fluency and acceptable language is the primary goal.

Common practices: The learner needs to acquire linguistic/communicative

competence- the knowledge of forms, meanings and functions of the
language. The learner must use this knowledge and take into account the
social situation in order to convey his/her intended meaning appropriately.

Language functions are emphasized over forms which are introduced for
each function.

Students work with language at discourse level. They learn about cohesion
and coherence. They work on all four skills from the beginning. Learning
activities are selected according to how well they engage the learner in
meaningful and authentic language use.

Comprehensible pronunciation is expected.

Role of the Teacher: The teacher is a facilitator of his/her students’

learning. As such he/she has many roles to fulfil. The teacher has two main
roles: the first role is to facilitate the communication process between all
participants in the classroom, and between these participants and the
various activities and texts. The second role is to act as an independent
participant within the learning-teaching group. He/she acts an advisor during
the activities. The teacher role is active.

Role of the Learner: Students are above communicators. They are actively
engaged in negotiation meaning – in trying to make themselves understood-
even when their knowledge of the target language is incomplete. They learn
to communicate by communicating. They interact a great deal with one
another. They do this in pairs, small groups and whole group. Students are
seen as more responsible managers of their own learning.

Type of instructional material: Students use the language a great deal

trough communicative activities such as games, role-plays or simulation and
problem-solving tasks.

The materials are prepared in the form of activity cards and pair
communicative practice material. Activities: information gap (when one
person in an exchange knows something that the other person doesn’t),
choice (they have the choice of what and how they want to say) and
feedback (the speaker receives feedback from his/her listener).

The use of authentic material: genuine newspaper articles, magazines, live

radio or TV broadcasts. Language-based realia: signs, magazines, add
graphics, etc.

Activities: scrambled sentences, picture strip story, language games and

role-play.

Syllabus: Communicative language teaching often uses a functional-

notional syllabus which specified the semantic-grammatical categories and
the categories of communicative function that learners need to express. In a
notional-functional syllabus, instruction is not organized in terms of
grammatical structure. In this model, a "notion" is a particular context in
which people communicate. A "function" is a specific purpose for a speaker
in a given context

Use of the L1: Its use is judicious (careful and sensible). It can be used only
to give explanations at lower levels. Translation may be used where students
need or benefit from it.

Attitude toward errors: Errors or from are tolerated and are seen as a
natural outcome of the development of communication skills. Students can
have limited linguistic knowledge and still be successful communicators.
Language is created by the individual often through trial and error.